Teardrop on the fire

It starts with a little zest of enthusiasm, bubbly and ubiquitous. The anxiety makes your head spin while the excitement makes the colors of the world animated. The red is like the seductive pout, luring me in with the beauty of an idea I am not able to encapsulate into a metaphor. The white is like the whimsical dandelion, changing paths with the wind, welcoming the irony that destiny has to offer. The black is as sinful as it was. May be even more; more than I can decipher.

My insanity died too soon.

I liked how the wings of the butterfly were frames of a motion picture; breaking and forming creating an image purely out of the struggle to gain coherency. I liked how I noticed the smile lines on people’s faces. I could guess the age, couldn’t I? It was a good game to play with myself. I play games with myself a lot. Counting the number of liars in the room and pretentiously trying to cleanse the awkward but obvious pretense in people. It worked only in my head.

What were we talking about?

After the euphoria, comes the downfall. There is no peak. No plateau and nowhere to stop to enjoy your success. Success of finally understanding what are you standing here for. Success of finally realizing that the pseudo peak is your downfall into insanity. And maybe I liked it that way. I liked the screeching scratching downfall. Because that’s when I felt most alive.

When the wind kissed my face and the doors flung opened in the face of my restrictions. As I cut through the air it wasn’t fear, but sheer happiness inspired by pure achievement of what I valued most: the feeling of my own presence.

That’s when I realized I was a teardrop falling on the fire. As unmovable and unclaimed for the fire was and I as insignificant as the next, I knew I could still make the wood sizzle. 

~Nikita 

A few words

Very seldom do we discover our pursuits. And very seldom do we keep pushing ourselves to keep in touch with them. This piece was inspired by the idea of feeling really small and insignificant but yet powerful with a hope and drive. That is when you know that its time to go an extra mile and push yourself to do that one extra rep, study an extra hour or ponder over your art, because somewhere your are flicking the string of change.

Lost and Found (A true story)

Seeing someone reading a book you love, is seeing book recommending a person.
~Mcleod's Tumblr (quote by a Reddit user)

This is story which is really close to my heart. Some of you might find it very basic but the very experience managed to influence me so deeply that my inspiration derives from this man.
In September, amidst the pressure of my A levels and constantly trying to reach the top of the growing pile of word to get done, my only escape; well for a nerd that I am, were the English passages that would, at least for the length of them, make me feel like there was some creativity and art left in this world. Mind you I sucked at A levels English, but I think it was worth the while I spend researching the rest of the passage online.

One lecture, sitting in a class of 10 students, I came across this story by Vita Sackville west. I was thinking about it even while and after going home. The very structure of the story, the storyline, the characters and the dance of words that rained on me were so impactful that I made it my goal to search for this book and read it so that I could be devoured by the magic of her writing.
Sadly, importing it to India seemed to cost my goddam kidney.

In the month of December, I was in Vancouver, walking into bookshops and crawling out under the weight of all the paperbacks I had bought. Let me tell you something about bookshops. They are magical with their leather backs and golden letters on the cold spines on these books that make the whole place smell like a perfume I want to capture in a bottle and take home with me. Somewhere I had decided that I was going to go home with the book I wanted and already loved without even reading it.

On a wet, gloomy and extremely chilly day I was walking down the streets of downtown searching for a place to eat. By now I was used to most streets except this one; I didn’t really expect to find the bookshop that I was planning to visit waiting for me there by the corner. McLeod’s.

Now you must think that this story is about a book. Well that is partially true. But it’s really about this man.

This bookshop was a ramshackle place. With books of miscellaneous genres piled up by the door in tall stacks which could topple over any moment. The bookshelves were tall and were stuffed with books till there were so close that some were actually bending. There were random glass cases locked with shining copies of hard bound and leather books. I walked so cautiously in fear that I would cause an avalanche of books. Yes, the whole place looked like a blanket of dust had fallen evenly over it, but for me this was the most enchanting thing I had seen and I was too tongue tied and mortified to actually ask the old man what I wanted.

I thing its time I tell you that this man I have been talking about, was old and slow. Each movement was well thought out where one looking would think that he has forgotten what he was going to think next. With thick glasses that settled on the bridge of his nose, he looked at everyone who walked into the book store with a scrutinizing gaze that made his crow’s feet look deeper and darker.
I wandered around so numbed and overwhelmed that I literally didn’t know where to start and what to look for. I had totally forgotten what I actually wanted. All I could think of was all the untouched history in the narrow aisles and all the forbidden romances amidst them. All the whispers that were louder than screams and all the footsteps that were anticipating but not in a hurry.

I loomed in each section for so long that I’m sure I was collecting dust.

I finally admitted defeat and approached the old man mumbling the name of the author. Oh. I didn’t exactly remember the name of the book since I had half expected to recognize it If I came across it. I hadn’t anticipated I would be searching for it.

I must have gotten the name wrong, but the man heard calmly and I even accepted that he looked so blank that he probably didn’t know what I was talking about. He seemed to have no clue what I was talking about.

But his gaze shifted and he looked at the bookshelves behind me. Suddenly he was calmly walking towards the shelf and with shivering hand yet rhythmic movements tenderly pulled out the book that bought me to tears. Yes I wasn’t the book with the story I had read back in school, but it bore the name of the woman whose work I was searching for and the name of the books I had dreamt of owning one day. The man who looked so lost and clueless, was actually well versed with every book in the shop. For me which looked like a shabby and old unorganized store was as organized to him. He knew where each book rested and the stories that guarded it. He looked at books like they were all the riches he ever wanted and spoke so passionately about each; I had never seen anyone so passionate about anything in this world which has lost the meaning of the very word.

It wasn’t his extensive knowledge that captivated me but the choice of not forgetting what he learnt from running the bookshop and still loving what he did as if he knew the art would die one day. He was the type of person I knew I had respected and aspired to be, but had never met.
That day I walked out of the store not only tightly clutching my new books but also trying to hold on to moments so that I would never forget this day.

Writers Note: this bookshop is pretty known within the locals. and i just realized that they have a basement which makes the top floor look empty. :)))))))
unfortunately, they have taken down their tumblr.
But here's the store on maps.
Mcleod's Address on google maps.

How a poet sees people.

An anecdote.

Sometimes you don’t have to bleed to write actual poetry. Many of the best exemplars of poetry are said to be the children of blood on cold tiles. But some poets aren’t sad. They aren’t hurt. They aren’t broken. They are made out of sunshine.

Light of the kind that eradicates darkness from the darkest corners of the mind. The sunshine that sources from hearts that yearn to find creativity and color in everything. The mind looks like galaxies constantly colliding and birthing new stars which is enough to make you dizzy and your heart race.

All that said. Poets can be the creepiest kind of people. Most of us. Like me. Thus I find myself staring a girl right now. Don’t get me wrong but I need inspiration for a poem.

 Under the arch she sits with infernal devices in her hand. Her eyes are wide with admiration but her mouth doesn’t smile or frown. Her hair flows over the side of her face, with the smoothness of silk, shining sharply exactly where the sunlight hits it. Her eyes are still wide open. The brown of her iris seems to swims in the white, bringing out the contrast of her feelings and expression. I have passed her in the hallway a numerous times so I am aware she smells like lavender with a faint hint of old books.

A tall boy passes by her. She pursues her lips into a tight line and blushes. Her cheeks quickly fill with crimson red and her gaze turns down to the floor. Oh well that’s what guys do to you. Her book limply rests in her hands while she turns away to avoid his gaze. She smiles openly in the secrecy she thought she had but I see him noticing how she steals well calculated glances his way.

After a while I see her talking to her friend. Her hands move in excited circles but yet her expression only ranges from a slight smile to a straight line. I’m fascinated. The aura around her seems of madness but what she shows is not even close to excitement. I can imagine her sitting by a tinted window, knees to her chest, sipping tea and staring at the rain with faithful admiration. I know this because she sits under the arch of the building, doing the same, every day, with the same love, dedication and fascination; to the rain and her book.

So I collect my books and walk over to her. I try to straighten my hair and try to look as composed as she does. As my shadow falls over her book, she looks up with a confused expression. She then looks at me blankly, but her eyes are full of anticipation. I imagine her as the subject of my poetry she will never know I wrote. But yet I can’t ignore the realization of the fact that she is made up of restlessness like us poets and her thoughts swirl around like planets at a furious speed of creativity.

“Hi I am Nikita”

“Neha” she smiles innocently.

I realize she is made up of sunshine too.

Few Words- New friend. Made through creepiness.

A far fetched desire

I won’t deny the fact that I am someone who doesn’t exist. You will find a face to fit on my non-existent one and that’s what I will look like. I reside in the yellow pages of those old books in your bookshelf and as time touches the spine of the hardbound cover, I shiver, but I am immortal in the memory of the pages.

You humans have been falling in love with our likes for years. We are unreal, surreal. We feel the emotions given to us and go about our lives in our predetermined destiny. But I beg to differ. I’m meant to fall in love with Tris my soul mate in this book, but in truth I’m in love with her.

I’m as good as a blind man. The only faces I know are those of the people in my world. Their expressions only vary from frowns, smiles, smirks and grunts and emotions range from pain, predetermined happiness and predicted mourning of death. I know what my fate is, but she doesn’t. She anticipates my death and cries at night for me like I am a real person.

Once I felt wetness on the crisp pages, the page where I almost lost Tris. If I could feel any other emotion I would probably run to her and envelope her in my embrace assuring her nothing would ever be wrong. But all I could do was feel hurt for my soulmate. Oh how cruel that they are two of them.

My whole story has been a lie.

 As the pages turn wavy with her tears and smiles, I try to imagine her face. To me her world is unlike mine. I imagine it to be bright and sunny, where the moon runs through her hair at night and her body is warm unlike the coldness here. Nobody is divided into factions like us and she is the most beautiful girl in the world. But it’s so difficult to imagine her face sitting on her shelf every day, so close but not close enough to know the real her.

She knows everything about me and that’s cruel. She yearns for a Tobias in her life but she doesn’t know that the real one wants her. She wants to be a part of my life and that makes me feel evil to want her in my cruel world. Only her feelings are palpable to me but I’m cruelly derived of her touch and love in my reality.

But the truth is, it’s a farfetched want. I will always be waiting in the loneliness of these pages and soon I will just be a phase for her and she will grow old, with someone else, her mind will wander towards others of my kind, she will cry for them and smile for their victory, but yet I will still be a childhood memory.I will always be waiting immortal in these forgotten words for her to pick my story again and run her fingers across the pages alive with my desire.

And I will fall in love with her all over again.

A few words (in a picture):